Over the past few years, more than 325 large companies, from AT&T to Xerox, have converted traditional pensions, which reward employees for long service, to plans that credit workers for each year they work and allow them to take the money in a lump sum when they leave.

Whether a switch to such a "cash-balance" plan would be good or bad for you depends on how long you have worked for and plan to continue working for the same company. If you spend your entire career with a single employer, a traditional pension plan is almost sure to be a better deal.That's because benefits are usually calculated by multiplying your years on the job by a percentage of your salary during your highest-paid years. And because most workers earn their highest salary toward the end of their career, that's when they really start to rack up the benefits.

But only one out of 10 Americans works for the same company for 30 years or more. For employees who switch jobs several times during their careers, retirement benefits from a traditional pension can be disappointing. Just as the benefit formula generally rewards long-term workers, it penalizes job hoppers.

If you work for a company for fewer than, say, five years, you could wind up with nothing at all. Even if you are "vested" when you leave a company -- meaning that you have earned a nonforfeitable right to benefits -- the firm can hold onto the money until you reach retirement age.

Cash-balance plans resemble 401(k)s in that you have a personal account that's yours to take with you when you leave. But there are significant differences. You make no contributions to a cash-balance plan; the company contributes all the money and assumes all the investment risk. Each year, an amount equal to a percentage of your salary goes into the account and is guaranteed to earn a predetermined interest rate, which is usually tied to an index such as the consumer-price index or Treasury-bill rate.

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One study comparing traditional pensions with cash-balance plans found that two-thirds of plan participants -- mainly those who hopped from job to job -- would receive a larger benefit with a cash-balance plan than with a traditional pension. Women, who often interrupt their careers for several years to take care of children, may have the most reason to cheer a switch to a cash-balance plan.

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